An introduction

 It occurred to me after giving this link to a couple people that you would have to read several years of entries to get to an introduction. I think maybe I should make it something I include occasionally. 

My name is Beth. I am a 35 year old woman living in Texas. I have been diagnosed with major depressive disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, borderline personality disorder, alcohol dependence, and bulimia nervosa. I live with my parents at the moment and 2 cats.

I include the cats because they are a big motivation to stay alive. I have been hospitalized more times than I could possibly count. About half of those were for depression/suicidal ideation and the other half for detox/alcohol. I've also been to residential treatment for bulimia and rehab several times for alcoholism. In all honesty, I will probably end up inpatient again in the next couple weeks for self harm and suicidal ideation. It's just a question of if I choose to go or the choice is made for me. 

I am not currently working. I lost my last job after I had the brilliant idea to get a motel room and try to kill myself without calling in sick to work. I then ignored all the texts from work for those days in the motel and the days in the ICU after. A few days ago I updated on my journey trying to apply for disability since then. I have had a variety of jobs. I have my bachelors degree in biology. I tried to work on my masters, but alcoholism got in the way of that. 

Currently, I am trying to recover from the bulimia.. while also trying to lose weight. That's tricky. I drank a couple weeks ago, but before that I had been sober since December.. before that sober since September.. before that since April... basically drinking every few months, which is better than I managed for years. I'm not so much trying to stop self harm because I am dealing with a lot of depression and anxiety and hopelessness. 

I don't have much else to say. I will just generally say there should be a trigger warning for the blog, but I really try to be aware of the people who might be reading. I am mostly writing for myself, but it helps me to think someone might read this because it makes me feel like writing has some purpose. I'm not so good at keeping up with journals, but this blog has been going since 2014. 

Oh and to explain the name and the url.. The blog was originally called Crazy or Sick after a conversation I had with a therapist. She objected to calling myself crazy, but I tried to explain that it bothers me less to say crazy than it does to say I'm sick. At some point I changed the name to Twice the Devil's Thirst, which is a line in a song. It says "I played the fool and broke the rules, and let them say their worst 'cause I had an angel's face and twice the devil's thirst." People always used to tell me that they wouldn't have suspected me of being an alcoholic or even in AA they would say they would never have thought I drank so much, so I guess I don't have the face of an alcoholic. I definitely have the thirst of an alcoholic though. 

Reading and remembering

 So since I've decided to come back to this blog, I decided I should reread old entries. I'm not sure why I thought this was a good idea because in the past my rule was that I wasn't allowed to read old journals. If I did read them, it was often in an effort to sabotage any progress I had made. It's just that I tend to journal the negative things. I tried guided journals that have you write about gratitude and hope, and it just isn't what I am trying to accomplish when I journal. Here is a little different because I write under the assumption that someone will read it, which may or may not be the case. That means I also tend to journal objectively and explain events that occurred and about people in my life. I just try to include what happened before I process my feelings about it. 

Still, I'm currently reading from 2016, and there's not a whole lot positive that happened that year. My life consisted of drinking and working and sleeping and very little else. I try to forget those years when I was drinking for a couple of reasons. 1) It was a very negative time and I was very sick. I was living in an apartment that was a total mess. I was drinking and cutting. I had pretty much lost all friends. 2) Despite that, I miss those days. I miss being physically sick and so weak I couldn't carry things up stairs. I miss being able to numb out everything with alcohol. I miss my job and my apartment even if it was unlivable. I miss my AA friends.

So I honestly think that I am reading this as self sabotage again. Trigger warning for this. I am currently self destructive and a little suicidal, and I'm not really actively trying to change that. I lied about the extent of the self harm and the suicidal thoughts to both my therapist and the PA that does my meds. I ordered razors and first aid supplies on Amazon. I told myself that's progress because cutting has a much lower risk of infection than the burning I was doing, and it heals faster. I can't really explain why I don't want the suicidal thoughts to go away. I think the best I can explain it is that I read a book about borderline personality disorder that left me viewing suicide attempts as a massive form of self harm. I also over the years have encountered staff in hospitals that didn't really take me seriously if I was just suicidal but hadn't actually done anything; so if I'm going to end up back inpatient (which seems likely), I feel like I need to do something. 

The biggest thing I miss right now is other people. I miss having friends. I miss having coworkers. I miss having anyone in my life that wasn't my parents or my brother. You might thing that would inspire me to reach out to them, but I am also reading this and seeing how toxic I was. That particular job... I made no effort to hide the self harm. They knew about my drinking. I left at least twice.. maybe it's 3 times to go IP, but mostly I worried people. It's the same with people from AA. I was way to dependent on a couple of people, and that generally means when I go downhill they are the ones to get hurt. I can't bring myself to reach out to them when I am doing quite badly. It would be unfair to them. Although as I am writing this, I at least posted a photo on facebook so that they know I'm alive. 

I also miss my independence despite the fact that I was clearly not doing a good job at living on my own. I write about going shopping and wandering around stores all the time. I write about sleeping past noon (I was working 3:30PM-12AM at the time). I also miss the freedom to drink, which makes no sense because I was so mentally and physically unwell. I had to go to the ER more than once for dehydration and low potassium because I kept vomiting everyday. In some ways being physically unwell made me feel better because at least it was visible. Depression tends to be invisible, or at least I make an effort to hide it. 

I don't know. I think I am rambling. The synopsis is that I am rereading this blog, and I think it's to sabotage myself. I need to stop, but I keep going. 

Disabled

 Please if anyone reads this and has some kind of negative opinion about people being on disability, just keep it to your self. Let's not criticize the suicidal girl, ok? Feedback is always welcome, but I know this is a touchy topic. 

Back in May or June of 2020, I was inpatient followed by 2 suicide attempts. I was actually in that hospital for 18 days, which is pretty much unheard of here, but things were just that bad. While I was there, my parents suggested I get a disability attorney and try applying again. I applied back in 2017 or 2018, and I was denied. It took so long to hear back that basically I had gotten enough better that they said I wasn't sick enough. I'm paraphrasing because I don't remember the actual decision. Anyway, my parents said I should get an attorney because almost no one gets approved in this state. Of course, I then went to residential and then inpatient and then residential again, so it wasn't until November 2020 that I found an attorney and applied. 

Then I waited. 

I mean there was some things that happened.. mainly I had to continue to update my case manager at the attorney's office about when I was in treatment and what doctor I was seeing. In October of 2021 (so almost a year later), I had a video call with a psychologist to basically ask me a bunch of questions and then he reports back to the disability office. Here I made the mistake of mentioning my alcoholism. I tried to be very clear that I haven't been drinking regularly during the time since I have been "disabled." As bad as 2020 was, I lost my job in February, and since then I drank on less than 10 days. Pretty much all those days correspond to my suicide attempts or suicide plans. In 2021, I drank in March or April, once in September, and once in December. 

Still, in January 2022, I finally got a decision. Of course it was denied, which I expected. What matters to me is the reason. 

"You said you were unable to work as of 02/14/2020 because of major depression and anxiety. 

We have determined that you are not entitled to disability benefits. We have reviewed the facts in your case and decided that drug addiction and/or alcoholism is a contributing factor material to a finding of disability. This means you would not be disabled if you stopped using drugs and/or alcohol. Therefore, we cannot consider you disabled under the law."

I am not going to pretend I am not an alcoholic. I am not going to deny I have lost a job because of alcoholism... although it was a little complicated. The fact is that I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety 10 years before I started drinking. I was depressed before the alcoholism. I was depressed during periods of sobriety. I was severely depressed the times I was in treatment in 2020 and 2021, and obviously I wasn't drinking while I was in residential/inpatient. My depression is not caused by my alcoholism. I mainly drank in the past 2 years because I was suicidal, and it's a lot less difficult to do that when you're drunk. I had to explain all this to the case manager at the attorney, and I honestly can't remember what I told them about the alcoholism in the beginning. She seemed to understand me and said they'd file an appeal, which will probably be denied again. Then if they appeal again, I can actually request a hearing and explain things. 

If you're wondering how I reacted to the decision.. not so well. On the surface, I acted like it was fine because I was too ashamed to tell my parents the reason for the decision. Shame and guilt and depression are probably a lot of what led to drinking last week. Since then, I cannot tell if it's a direct result of drinking or if it's related to the shame again, but my thoughts are pretty horrible. *TW* I'm not sleeping well, and I'm not just having my usual suicidal thoughts at night. I'm wondering about stabbing myself. I'm wondering about all sorts of cutting. I'm wondering about pouring boiling water on myself. Then there's stuff I won't go into. Once again on the surface, I am fine. I am afraid to speak about what's going on in my head because I don't want to be hospitalized at this point. I think it's inevitable, but I am trying to put it off a bit longer. 

Mentally, I have kinda given up on disability, but I feel like I've waited this long and should stick it out. Plus, I don't want to tell this attorney's office that I've given up after all the work they've done. Also, I do legitimately think that working right now would be a bad idea. If nothing else, I'm probably going to end up in the hospital soon. 

Coming back

I probably won't write for very long. This post is mostly to tell anyone who might still read this that I am planning to start writing again. For most of 2020, I didn't write because I was constantly in and out of treatment. In 2021, I just didn't feel my life was worth writing about. I still don't, but I need to write somewhere. I prefer this over a paper journal. 
As far as life goes

The good

• I haven't been inpatient since April 2021
• I am consistently doing therapy and taking my meds (all 6 of them)
• I gained a bunch of weight over the past 2 years, but I've lost 25lb now

The bad

• I am still living with my parents (although I suppose the positive there is that I have somewhere to live)
• I applied for disability back at the end of 2020 and am still dealing with that, which will probably be a whole post that I'm not ready to write today
• I have only been sober since January 25th, but I am not drinking regularly
• I have been off and on in a relapse for bulimia since I was last inpatient
• I am on 6 fucking medications that I'm not even sure are working
• I'm currently pretty self destructive and suicidal

I might honestly edit to add to the lists because there's more. My life is still very boring and repetitive, but my thoughts and depression are constantly changing. I am emotionally attached to this blog because it goes back pretty far, so I would never start over unless I had to. I don't know if anyone will read this. It doesn't really matter. That's all for now because this was an impulsive decision to write again, and I should probably give it some thought before I say much else. Thanks if anyone is around and made it through this post.

Why does feeling like dying make me think that I've been living?

I couldn't think what to call this post, so I'm going to steal a line from a Town Pants song. Honestly, I'm staring at the computer not sure what to even say. I think everyone around me has a different idea of how I am doing. They are all pretty much convinced that I am doing better than I am because I am choosing not to mention certain behaviors. I think maybe in some ways I am better than I was. My mood is not 100% depressed now. However, I am wondering if maybe my mood is better because my behavior is worse. 

The main behaviors that I am choosing not to tell my therapists (IOP or individual) are the purging and the cutting/burning. My psychiatrist knows some about the self harm but not the bulimia. In my mind, neither is that bad. I am usually only purging once a day and the self harm isn't everyday and isn't that severe compared to what I've done in the past. I'm afraid to mention the bulimia because I don't want my new therapist to insist I need to see someone who specializes in eating disorders.. some people get weird about that. I haven't mentioned the self harm because she already seems concerned about the suicidal thoughts. I am trying to convince her that those aren't new or that severe. She seemed particularly worried when I mentioned the trip in 3 months and how it was overwhelming to think of being alive that long. I couldn't come up with an explanation for that which made sense. 

The behavior that I certainly have not told anyone about is a new form of self harm (well not new.. just not one I have done recently). I might have gotten incredibly triggered last week by something in the book on borderline personality disorder that I was reading. Towards the end of the book there is basically a rating system for suicide attempts.. it ranks them from least severe to most severe with details like type and number or pills and location of cuts. Several other methods are included. I knew I shouldn't read it, but I did. It didn't increase my suicidal thoughts. It did sort of justify the self harm because on the rating scale it would be probably a zero. I started with taking 8 tylenol PM at bedtime.. which felt really bizarre. I spent a couple hours debating if I really needed to go to the restroom and debating if I would be able to walk because I was dizzy when I stood up. The second night I took 4 tylenol and 8 tylenol PM. The goal of this (which I can't really explain) is to see if I can damage my liver between now and when I have my annual physical next week. I wanted something that would show up on the blood tests because that would be proof that I actually did damage. I really don't know why this is so appealing. I am afraid if I tell anyone that they will decide I need to go inpatient. Maybe I need to go inpatient, but for the past year it's been very difficult to justify going without some attempt or a drinking binge or just something to prove I need to be there. The problem is that I think this will escalate. 

So everyone thinks I am doing okay. I do not think I am doing okay. I just have no idea how to communicate this because I don't really want to go inpatient, but I kind of want to be sick enough that I have to. I don't like others telling me I seem better when they have no idea what's going on in my head or in my life. 

I don't know what the point of this was, but I wanted to get it out. 

September

 I am probably writing way more often that I should be, but it helps me. I don't even know who is reading this anymore. 

Today's topic is what should have been a neat conversation with my parents about a trip they're planning, but in reality it has some pretty overwhelming implications. I actually already kind of knew about it because I'm observant. I knew my dad was buying tickets for a Cubs game, and then I noticed that the game was at Wrigley. We live in Texas, so obviously this meant some kind of trip would be planned. I did not see when the tickets were for, and I had no idea if the plan was to take me too. 

I am not a baseball fan. I find it at best boring and these days it would probably be very anxiety provoking since I don't handle crowds or noise well. I just didn't know until today if the plan was for me to go to Chicago with them and just not go to the game. They brought it up at lunch, and I kind of wanted to interrupt them and say I knew about the tickets because my dad was taking forever to get to the point, but I decided to be polite and listen. We ended up talking about if there was anything else to do in Chicago that I would enjoy since the game is only interesting to them and my brother. That was all fine, and we discussed the art institute and if there were any plays. I mentioned finding nice places to eat, but it seems pretty obvious that the omnivores are probably picking the restaurants because I sent them 2 cool vegan restaurants that they have no interest in. I also sent my mom a link for an italian beef restaurant (one of the foods they want to eat) that has a vegan beef sandwich. She said she would see if it was where we were going. (This is a tangent but I'm annoyed) I feel like I should get some say in where we eat because I already get stuck eating a lot of veggie burgers because we go to restaurants with no other options for vegetarians. They could at least pick one restaurant for me. That's not the point of this.. 

I think it should be apparent by now that I am not doing so well with the depression (and now the borderline). I still have a lot of suicidal thoughts. I'm just simultaneously thinking of what I want to do and questioning what other people will think my motives are. The book on borderline I am reading talks about how borderline patients are viewed as manipulative, but that that isn't the motive of the self harm or suicidal behavior. In my case, I am really quite miserable a lot of the time. My life is nothing I want it to be, and I have no real control over any of it. I feel trapped living with my parents. I have no car. I have very little money. I truly believe I am not well enough to get a job. Any amount of job stress would probably push me right over the edge. Still, waiting to find out about disability is taking forever, and I've had people question if I should even be waiting for it. Like the psychiatrist who did my assessment for IOP basically told me I shouldn't hope to get disability and shouldn't be waiting and how no one ever gets it and I should look for a job. I wanted to punch the man because it was a really tactless way to approach something that is none of his fucking business. So anyway, it's not about being manipulative, but I know it gets seen that way. 

Well, now I have this plan for a trip in September, and going would require me to be 1) alive and 2) not in the hospital. That's a really big commitment. Now I'm going back and forth in my head about how it would be better to have a suicide attempt now because I'd for sure be out of the hospital by September. It's not a really good place for my thoughts to be. I know that I could either approach this as motivation to get better or as a reason to just say fuck it because being alive 3 more months is overwhelming. I want to cry writing this. 

Things at home aren't good, but I think people (mainly my IOP therapist) think what's going on is no big deal. I complain a lot about my parent's dog, but pretty much everyday I deal with the dog deciding I am not allowed to fucking move. He doesn't bite hard, but he tries to jump on me and bite me if I'm typing (he's asleep at the moment, thank god), if I am just sitting reading, if I try to reach for my glass of water.. my very existence seems to be a problem, and I can't live like this. Then there's my parents arguing and my mom snapping at me for no apparent reason except I guess I said the wrong thing. She snapped at me twice yesterday because I was asking if she needed help making dinner (but she'll also be upset if no one helps her), and I've cried at least the past 2 days over how she snaps at me. This is the house I am stuck in for the foreseeable future. I mean other times my parents are loving, which is why no one seems to understand how bad it can be. Today after lunch, I went shopping with them, and my mom bought me 2 tops. If I bring up the financial problems or not having transportation in IOP, the therapist has questioned why I feel it would be a bad idea to work. I mean if nothing else it would look bad on my resume to lose another job because I tried to kill myself. That's how I lost my last job. So there's no way to really talk about everything and not then have to explain why it's not possible to get out of this situation any time soon. 

Three months is a long time. Oh and i start with a new therapist tomorrow. My mind has been going back and forth between wondering if maybe this person will be better and assuming it will be the same bullshit I have dealt with before. Will she immediately suggest IP? Will she also question why I can't work? Will she immediately want to do a family session as though that will help? 

I don't know. I legitimately have to stop typing because the dog is now awake and staring at me. Not even kidding. 

Making matters worse **TW**

 Just FYI this is probably going to be triggering, but for my own sake I need to get some things out

So I made the brilliant decision after getting my new diagnosis to buy Marsha Linehan's (creator of DBT) Cognitive-Behavioral Treatment of Borderline Personality Disorder. It is very enlightening, but it may be making matters worse at the same time. The book is intended for professionals and not so much for patients. It has a much more detailed and complex description of borderline personality disorder, and she also talks a lot about the tendency with borderline or suicidal patients to blame the victim or view them as manipulative. What she says about that has reminded me of therapists and doctors that I have had in the past. I assumed they were right in that either I wasn't working hard enough at therapy or simply that therapy would never work for me. I like this part

" Even if therapists believe that a particular treatment will be effective in the long run, because it has worked with other patients, helplessness in the face of the borderlines' intense suffering —suffering that causes the therapists reciprocal pain—is the repeated, day-to-day experience of working with these individuals. In the face of this helplessness the therapists may redouble their efforts. When the patients still do not improve, the therapists may begin to say that they are causing their own distress. The patients don't want to improve or change. They are resisting therapy (After all, it works with almost everyone else.) They are playing games. They are too needy."

I wish I could see all this as hopeful.. that maybe I just need to find the right therapist who can handle borderline. Really, it's making me feel hopeless because the likelihood of that is rather limited. I might get into a DBT program, which is terrifying in its own way, or I might not for whatever reason. I am dependent on insurance, transportation, and the fact that if I am honest about how I am doing there is always the risk of just being told I need to be inpatient. There's the risk that if I admit to purging daily, they will insist I need eating disorder treatment first.. and getting insurance to cover that is another nightmare.. and I honestly don't care about stopping right now. If I don't get a good therapist, I am just reminded of all the times therapy has failed in the past. 

But what's really bothering me now is this part in the book where she talks about how the primary goal in DBT is to decrease suicidal behaviors. It gets really triggering there.. 

"The desire to be dead among borderline individuals is often reasonable, in that it is based on lives that are currently unbearable. A basic tenet of DBT is that the problem is rarely one of distorting positive situations into negative situations. Instead, the problem is usually that a patient simply has too many life crises, environmental stressors, problematic interpersonal relationships, difficult employment situations, and/or physical problems to enjoy life or find meaning in it. In addition, the patient's habitual dysfunctional behavior patterns both create their own stress and interfere with any chance of improving the quality of life. In sum, borderline individuals usually have good reasons for wanting to be dead. "

and then

"Whatever the reason, I have at times been convinced by patients that they are right. Not only did I believe that their lives were unlivable, but I myself saw no way out for them. I felt hopeless myself [...]I believe that individuals at times make informed and rational decisions to commit suicide."

I am obviously taking a few parts out of a larger discussion (basically that the therapist must take a non-negotiable position against suicide), but you can see how it might be upsetting. So I really probably should stop reading this book, but it's kind of addictive because it's all so accurate. I have to take occasional breaks to not get totally sucked in since my mind was not in a great place to start with.

So I don't know why I am writing this.. but I just needed to get it out